So stunned were they by this apparition of darkness – even the hitee guards staring wild-eyed at the approaching figure – that all froze to the spot as the stranger stepped upon to the dais where the Sun King stood, and bent forwards as though to offer him a kiss.
It was the knife that broke the spell at last, emerging as though from nowhere, to be pressed against the throat of the golden-skinned god.
'Back!' Ash hollered, stopping them even as they began to rush to their master's aid. It seemed they did not did consider their Sun King to be invincible, after all.
They watched the blade at his throat; watched the face of the stranger, his dazzling white eyes and white teeth.
Ash ordered that his comrade be freed and brought before him. When no one moved he repeated his words – this time addressing the Sun King himself. 'Do it', he urged, 'and I will not kill you.'
Whether he believed him or not, Sun King responded with a trembling gesture to his followers.
They remained long moments standing there waiting for Baracha to be brought up from his hole. Eventually enough time passed for the disciples to begin shifting uneasily and to whisper amongst themselves. A stink of fear-sweat rose from the skin of the Sun King. The situation might have become farcical, if not for the hitees getting restless as their patience diminished. Ash was fully aware that, despite the risk to their god, one of them might break rank at any moment and try to rush him.
Finally the doors clattered open, and Ash barely recognised Baracha as they dragged him into the hall. When the prisoner looked up through his one sound eye to see the old farlander standing there in their midst, he reasoned that Ash must have come to finish vendetta and then die by his side. There would be no way out for them once the Sun King was slain. 'Now tell me,' Ash instructed the god. 'Tell me who you really are.'
The Sun King looked close to breaking, the sweat running off him in sheets. An actual puddle of it had formed around the soles of his bare feet.
At the first bubble of blood from the prick of the knife, the false deity began to babble in terror.
He told them all who he really was: how he had been born into a clan of travelling hedge-rogues, who made their living from one petty deception after another. He rambled on about how they had heard of the fallen mountain, about the ancient prophecy and how the idea had struck him fully-formed of masquerading himself as a god, with his family of chancers acting as his first disciples. Hushing to barely a whisper, he confessed to their murders and betrayals committed over the following years – no longer trusting them once his pre-eminence was established, removing them in one way or the other until only he himself remained.
By now the looks of alarm around Ash and the Sun King had turned to uncertainty and then anger.
'Please,' he pleaded. 'Surely a god's hand did indeed truly guide me here. Who could have done so without a spark of divine aid, I ask you? If I am not a god, then know at least that I am a god's chosen intermediary.'
'Then go to your god,' said Ash, and finally stepped away from him.
The assembled crowd did not try to stop the old Rshun from leaving. Instead they turned to the naked, golden man quivering before them… and fell on him as wild animals fall on their prey.
*
'And so you know all this from Baracha and Ash, that talkative pair?' inquired Nico, squinting in the sunlight of the stable.
'Well, I may have embellished the gaps a little, I confess. And I've heard other variations of the story told. But what counts is that my master was hardly grateful for Ash's intervention. No, he actually felt slighted by it, and from then onwards has never missed an opportunity to match himself against his rescuer, or to pass derogatory comments within the earshot of others. He most of all wishes for a reckoning between them both, to prove he is not second best after all.'
'But you think Ash would win such a contest?'
'Of course he would win. Haven't you been listening?'
Aleas had been digging around inside his robe as they spoke. He produced two dried preens, and tossed one to Nico.
'I'll tell you this much,' he continued. 'Consider a hundred vendettas conducted by this order – ninety-nine of those will involve the killing of greedy merchants or jealous lovers. Not for Ash, though: the Rshun have a name for him here. They call him inshasha, which means killer of kings.'
Nico bit into the dried fruit, relishing its smoky sharpness on his tongue. He swallowed some, considering all he had heard.
'And what is it they call Baracha?' he asked.
Before Aleas could reply a shadow fell across their laps. Olson stood in the doorway, hands planted on hips.
'What's this idling?' he sneered, taking in the two apprentices lazing on the stable floor. He squinted at Aleas's bloody lip. 'And you've been fighting, too!' He bustled towards them in his loose robes, grabbing each by the ear and pulling hard.
'Up! Up!' he commanded, yanking them simultaneously to their feet.
The sudden pain was sharp enough to blur Nico's vision. 'What do they call Baracha?' he nevertheless hissed, half bent-over in the grip of Olson's fingers.
Choking on a mixture of laughter and pain, Aleas managed to reply, 'Alhazii.'
*
'What's going on here?' bellowed a voice from across the courtyard as Olson hauled them, stumbling, from the stable. It belonged to Baracha, breaking off from his practice session with a great broadsword.
Both young men straightened up instantly, as Olson released them. 'I caught them lounging about, eating stolen food. They've clearly been fighting too.'
'Is that true, Aleas?' the Alhazii demanded of his apprentice. 'You squabble now in the dirt like a child?'
'Not at all,' Aleas replied as he wiped the remaining blood from his chin. 'We were merely practising our short-staff skills. I fear I was a little slow in defending myself.'
'Just practising?' The big man took Aleas by the chin, inspecting his wound. Displeased at the sight, he released it. 'I told you to stay away from this one, and now you see why. Remember, you are training to be Rshun. We do not settle our differences like dogs fighting in the street. If you have a problem with each other, then we must settle it in the proper way.'
Aleas and Nico exchanged apprehensive looks.
'But we have no problem between us,' Aleas said with care.
'What? You have been bled, boy.
'Yes – and it was but an accident.'
'It is still an insult!'
'Master,' said Aleas, 'I have hardly been insulted. It was merely sport.'
'Be quiet, Aleas.'
His apprentice looked to the ground glumly.
'We must settle this properly,' repeated Baracha, exchanging a knowing glance with Olson. 'And we will do it in the old way – you understand, the pair of you?'
Oh no, thought Nico, not liking the sound of that.
'A fine idea,' said Olson with a renewed sparkle in his eyes. 'I will fetch what they need.' And he hurried off towards the north wing.
'What we need?' echoed Nico, asking of no one in particular.
'We are going fishing,' said Aleas with a sigh, his gaze still fixed firmly on the ground.
Fishing? marvelled Nico, but he knew better than to open his mouth again. Instead he wondered, with a rising panic, what terrible ordeal could lurk behind such an innocent phrase.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Fishing 'You keep your distance from him, I see,' Kosh remarked in their native Honshu.
'I keep my distance from everyone,' replied Ash, passing his old friend the gourd of Cheem Fire.
Kosh took a drink and returned it. 'Aye. But particularly from the boy, is what I mean.'
'It's best for him that way.'
'Really? Best for him, or best for you?'